


Just Another Bad Day

by daaarkknight (orphan_account)



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Doesn't-get-any-heavier-than-this angst, Existential Angst is ALWAYS Funny, F/M, Gen, Heavy Angst, M/M, More angst, Shameless pile-on of suffering, The More the Better, Who Am I Kidding?, it's not even funny anymore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-10
Updated: 2019-12-12
Packaged: 2021-02-25 20:55:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 26
Words: 5,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21741811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/daaarkknight
Summary: Canon!Jason has been through too much. Don't you agree?It's about time he started smiling.
Relationships: Bruce Wayne/Dick Grayson, Implied Batman/Joker, Talia al Ghul/Bruce Wayne
Comments: 8
Kudos: 20
Collections: Batman, Batman Universe Series, Batman/Robin (Bruce/Dick), Batman: Under The Red Hood, BatmanFanfiction, Favorite Batman Fics, batman orignal characters





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FabulaRasa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FabulaRasa/gifts), [Mithen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mithen/gifts), [Unpretty](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unpretty/gifts), [LemonadeGarden](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LemonadeGarden/gifts).



Jason gets up. 

_Jason gets up._

Pretty boy. 

_He's_ _strong, Talia._

Batsy is mine now.

_Aaaaaaaaaaaah!_

Shut the fuck up. 

_Father, he's insane._

Honey, I'm just getting started. 

_He's glorious._

You've got the spark. 

_He's got what it takes._

You will do. 

_He will do._


	2. Chapter 2

Batman never kills the Joker. 

In any universe, Batman is genetically incapable of killing the Joker. 

It's not for the reason everyone thinks. 

It's not because they're 'polar opposites', or because one 'needs' the other. Although in their own right, those may be true.

It's not because Batman is afraid. Afraid to get his hands dirty. 

Afraid of _becoming_ the Joker.

He could never become the Joker.

All it takes is one bad day. 

And his bad day is already over.

No. 

The reason is... 

_Batman. I have a family._

_A wife and a kid on the way._

_They're gonna starve._

_I'm no good._

_I got fired._

_They fired me._

_I_ am _good._

_I just wasn't good enough._

_Do you know what that's like?_

_To not be good enough?_

_No, I suppose you don't._

_You're_ always _good enough._

_Always have been._

_You show up in the nick of damn time._

_Well, not this time._

Wait!

A splash _._

_Goodbye, Batman._

_Take care of them for me._

_Take care of me._

In their last moments, people are themselves.

They have nowhere else to be.

And the Joker, in his last moments, was a family man. Driven to distraction by an apparition falling out of the sky. 

A lost soul. 

And he found his peace. 

Or was trying to.

_I am here. I am alive. You are not. You will never be._

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha. 

_Taunt me. Take me. Try me. Test me._

_But leave Gotham alone._

No. 

I will leave _you_ alone. 

Everyone else is my message. 

My love.


	3. Chapter 3

_My son is dead._

_Joker._

Batman visits Joker in Arkham. 

Joker doesn't get many visitors. He's expecting this one, though. 

Batman walks in.

He knows what he has to do. 

He's come prepared to do it. 

Joker won't feel a thing. 

It will be painless. 

Like a mad dog being put down. 

_Sleep._

_Finally._

_My son is suffering no more. Thanks to you._

_Sleep._

Joker looks up. Batman looks down.

Their yinyang has begun.

Five minutes later, Batman walks out. 

A laugh echoes out behind him.


	4. Chapter 4

There was a time I had a sixpence

And a pocketful of rye.

Four-and-twenty

I baked in a pie.

When the pie was opened

They all began to sing.

It was horrible. 

I put them out of my misery.

_Blackbirds?_

Not quite. I hadn't acquired my taste for birds yet.

Now bats are another thing. 

Funny, nasty little creatures. 

Mice with wings.

_Yes._

_Aren't we._

Plague-bringers. 

_Survivors._

Potato potahto.

You aren't going to walk away from here. 

You know that, right? 

_You know, you're not insane._

_One day he's going to see that._

_He's going to see you paint that grin on along with your face._

Ahahahahaha

You really are too funny.

You think he doesn't already know? 

He sees the mask. 

_Then why doesn't he..._

Kill me? 

Because he gave birth to me. 

I am his mistake. 

To kill me is to kill himself.

Piecemeal. 

First me, then Harvey, then the rest. 

And once we are dead, 

You will see the Bat. 

In his true horror. 

In his ugliness. 

The ugliness we contain

So hedoesn't have to.

_I don't believe you._

You will. 


	5. Chapter 5

The story, heart-rending as it is, need not be repeated here. 

An orphan, sheltered by a bat. Tire wheels. Crowbar. Bucket. Red. Green. Black and blue.

The story is sad. And there is enough misery in the universe. 

All we need to know is Jason learned his lesson. 

Clowns bad. 

Bats worse. 


	6. Chapter 6

Oh, my son.

My son, my son. 

If only I had died instead of you.

My son, my son.

All the shards of a heart have to be carried around in a pocket.

Fake teeth, false smile.

Bronze heart. 

Flesh is too easily torn, you see.

One grave is enough. 

Two is too many. 

The shards don't fit together anymore. The butler carries them around on a silver tray. 

"Master Bruce. 

"Your heart."

"Ah.

"Not today, Alfred. 

"Not today." 


	7. Chapter 7

Does it make him cruel? 

No. 

Does it make him compassionate? 

No. 

Does it make him resentful? 

No. 

Nothing changes. 

_Why didn't I think of this before?_

It is Dick's birthday.

"Happy birthday, Dick!"

"Hey, Bruce." 

Later. 

"How long has he been like this?"

The butler sighs. 

"Perhaps it is for the best."

"How can you say that, Alfred?"

Dick walks out. 

Over the next few months, Dick is determined to be a good son. 

To give his father room. 

To let go. 

Dick is a very good son.

Bruce is a very good father. 

(The brass heart, you see. It works the same, for all intents and purposes.)

They go to the movies. They go fishing. They go rappelling. 

_Why didn't I discover this sooner?_

_It is magical._

He gives and gives and gives. 

It is a fresh start. 


	8. Chapter 8

There comes a time in every man's life when he learns what he can live without.

An appropriate amount of grief is shown. 

Alfred and Dick are satisfied. 

Bruce has moved on. 

It is healthy. 

He has even adopted another boy. 

(A lesson learned is a lesson shelved. For later.)

The new boy is a prodigy. 

A true boy wonder. 

And if Bruce's eyes grow dull and flat, who is to notice? 

He _smiles_ now. 

Alfred ignores the chill in his stomach. 


	9. Chapter 9

Batman likes to play demon. 

Ra's al Ghul likes to play god.

_The Detective is dead._

_It is up to me now._

_To give him back his life._

_Go, daughter._

_Fetch the son._

A steaming, rancid corpse falling apart at the seams of its putrid skeleton. 

_Father, it will be a monster._

_There are no monsters, my daughter. There are only the misunderstood._

_This is not life, this is death!_

_Silence!_

There are secrets in the universe. 

A mother's love for her son. Veiled by the mistakes of another lifetime, bleary at the edges.

But there is no mistaking it. Jason is not picking the Batmobile tires by accident.

It has the unmistakable scent of _plan._

A life thrown away. _My weakness. My love._

And now Talia has to come face-to-face with the monster her silence has created.

She cringes. The Pit is merciless. She would know. 

_It is to save you from the Pit that I kept you hidden, my child._

_But all roads lead to Rome._

What was it Bruce saw that fateful night, in the eyes of a street urchin? 

He doesn't know. 

(Some forces are stronger than water.)

A dark underling, a shadow of himself. Snarling, tensed, putting up more of a fight than strictly necessary. 

"I'm not going to hurt you.

"I'm Bruce."

Off comes the cowl. 

"Will you come home with me?" 

Far away, a mother sighs. 


	10. Chapter 10

To ask _is there an afterlife_ is a taboo question in modern society.

It is understood. 

Whether there is one or not changes nothing. Life goes on. 

Jason awakes. He gets an answer. 

No one should get an answer in their lifetime.

It is enough to drive one mad.

_He is mad._

_Father._

"Yes." 

Talia swallows.

A mother's rage makes it's way to her stomach. From there to be excreted.

"He will serve."

Jason serves. 

The Fighting Pits. Sweat. Blood and guts. Pig squeals. 

He shows his pedigree. Roughness, no form, no elegance. 

Just blind ferocity. He tears apart with his bare hands the best warriors of the League, with all their training, with all their skill. Blood clots clinging to his hair. 

Talia trembles. 

_There is a reason, Talia, I exercise control. I know what I am, what I can be._

_And what is that, Detective?_

_He doesn't answer._

_Now she knows._

"He is a God." Ra's al Ghul's eyes are shining.

Talia looks away. Those eyes echo Jason's too much.

"Yes."

Her father looks at her. 

"Do you know who he reminds me of?"

Talia stares at him. 

Ra's al Ghul's ancient eyebrows begin to rise.

"I know."

"Yes. Wondrous, isn't he? The Detective has trained him better than I thought."

Only in front of her would her father ever admit weak judgement.

"But training doesn't survive the pits." His eyebrows furrow.

"Where does he get these children, Talia?"

"I suspect that will always remain a mystery, Father."


	11. Chapter 11

What is justice?

_What is funny?_

Justice is a heaviness in my stomach.

_Funny is a lightness in my chest._

Justice is a gravestone in winter. Ground connecting with knee. Drenched pants.

_Funny is an acrid smell of acid and bone. A scream and a laugh._

Justice is forgetting. Just for a moment. How empty I feel.

_Funny is remembering. Just for a moment. What it felt like to feel._

I'm bad at justice.

_I'm bad at funny._

They don't notice.

_They notice. (Not for long.)_


	12. Chapter 12

Red Hood. 

That is what I want to be. 

_Are you sure?_

He must see his own hideous face. The last thing.

 _You are_ not _him._

Why do you care, lady? Ever since I...you've been _hovering._ Don't think I haven't noticed. 

_My father...doesn't want what's best for you._

I'm crazy, lady, not stupid. I know. 

_Don't let him...pull the strings of your mind._

But let you, instead. Is that what you're getting at?

_No. There is only one man who has your best interests at heart. You know his name._

Jason looks at her.

"Yes.

"I know."


	13. Chapter 13

Tim Drake has no parents. 

That he can think of. 

When he was young, he encountered an old newspaper clipping in his father's drawer.

_Thomas and Martha Wayne Murdered. Son Bruce Survives._

Son Bruce survives.

_Jackson and Anna Drake Murdered._

_Son Timothy Survives._

He could go up to the Manor, holding the newspaper clipping in his hand.

"Look. See. I know, now. We're two of a kind."

And Bruce, kindly Bruce, good-hearted Bruce, generous Bruce, would look at him, tears swimming in his eyes.

"Come in," he would say.

"Come in, son.

"Everything will be okay.

"It will all be alright.

It will be quite alright."

And Tim would step in, and the Manor door would shut behind him, loud and decisive.

"Yes, dad," he would whisper.

And Bruce would turn around, slightly puzzled, not sure if he'd heard correctly. 

"Did you say something?"

And Tim would look up, and his gaze would be that of a stranger. 

"No, Mr. Wayne.

"Nothing at all."


	14. Chapter 14

Jackson and Anna Drake don't have long to live after that.

(A plane crash in Czechoslovakia.) 

And Tim regrets his wishes. 

It is one thing to be an orphan. It is another to _be_ an orphan.

His wish is topped with bitterness and cream. His days are agony. His nights are worse.

He bites into the fruitcake that is Bruce Wayne.

Bruce Perfectly-Functioning Wayne. Erstwhile father. Demented son.

Tim doesn't like him one bit. His eyes are shallow; his lips are blood-bitten.

Like a venomous snake that has lost its fangs. 

He reminds Tim of himself. 

Bruce adopts Tim. 

(A shell of a boy for a shell of a man.)

Neither of them can complete the other. They're both missing the same piece. 

"Do you miss your parents?" Bruce asks him one day, blue eyes dazzling in their dark knowledge. 

"Yes." Tim answers.

Bruce nods.

"But you didn't miss them. Before."

"No." Tim answers.

Bruce nods again.

Tim is getting tired. Bruce's questions are like sharp fangs, digging into his skin. Digging, digging, digging.

He knows the man like he knows his own skin. 

He knows he should be afraid.


	15. Chapter 15

Dick is the twelfth sergeant of police in Bludhaven to have been shot.

It barely makes news. 

Dick is in a hospital-white gown. Television on and blaring. Blue florescent lights. 

He blinks.

"Nightwing."

A dry voice crackling in his ear.

"What's up, B." 

Dick smiles wryly, reflecting that there was a time Bruce would have dropped everything, the entire city sitting on his lap, and rushed to his boy wonder.

Now Bruce probably thinks something along the lines of _he's_ _not worse than Jason._

Dick laughs out loud.

"What's so funny."

"I'm sorry, but...do you have gravel in your mouth?"

A semi-amused snort.

"I'm telling Alfred you're overworking your throat again."

"Only you would worry about my throat while in the ER for severe abdominal lacerations."

"I see my medical files could make it."

"Dick." Bruce's voice is thick. "I'm on a case."

"Oh.

"Of course."

_Tell me something new._

Brine rolls down his cheeks. There is no one here, so he doesn't try to stop.

"Dick."

"Yeah." His voice is fine. Even. He's thankful for small favors.

"I love you."

Dick swallows.

The moon outside looks like cratered cheesecake.

"Dick?"

"If you meant that, you'd be saying it right now to my face."

"Dick."

"Don't ever call me again."

Dick wrenches the device loose from his eardrum and swallows it, hoping it would choke him.


	16. Chapter 16

It was not something Dick could control.

One moment Bruce was in his arms.

The next they were on the floor, grappling with each other, Bruce tearing Dick's clothes off with his teeth.

"My son."

_My son. My son. My son._

_Flesh and blood let me hold you._

_No. It is forbidden._

The Manor, as if concurring, has drawn its shadows tighter around the pair. Alfred will be--should be--here. Any minute.

He will collect the man to his chest who is asking for too much. From the only son he has. 

_My son._

Bruce's eyes are prickling. Dick's chest is smarting.

_Too much, too much, too much._

At the last moment, Bruce looks into Dick's eyes and sees the fear.

_My son._

_Afraid._

_Of me._

Bruce picks himself up. He buckles his pants. 

He picks up the scraps of Dick's clothing, and holds them together, seemingly trying to sew a childhood back.

"I'm sorry."

The words have no meaning. An echo of an echo.

Bruce's footsteps die away. 

Dick's unfocused eyes stare out of their sockets at the coffered ceiling, as he lies in the only place he has grown to love and feels the stone cold on his back.

His erection throbs.

He wraps his hand around it.


	17. Chapter 17

Timothy Jackson Wayne is twelve. A mature age. To understand the mysteries of life.

_The boy knows too much._

_Does he know you are a murderer?_

Bruce knocks on Tim's door.

"It's the middle of the night," says a rumpled head.

"I know.

"There's something you should know about me, Tim.

"I'm a monster.

"I'm not a good man."

"I know."

"Okay.

"Goodnight."


	18. Chapter 18

Jason heads to Bludhaven. 

_Years ago, Dick asked Bruce,_ _"Why are you all in black, and I'm all bright?"_

_Bruce answered, unflinching,_

_"So they go for you."_

Batmanneedsarobin, (bait bait bait) 

He trains Robins to be ~~formidable warriors~~ distractions. [Maybe that's why Jason's dead? He never got the memo] 

That's why Dick, despite being far from the best combatant, is the Robin everyone remembers. 

(That and his smile)

Dick is eating cereal. He hears a knock on the sliding doors of his terrace. 

He sighs, throws his napkin on the counter and gets up. His knuckles are itchy.

_Bruce._

_How the hell do you_ always _manage to be too late?_

_Must be your superpower._

Dick opens the window. 

A sparse, shivering frame stands outside. 

"Hello, Dick."

Dick's eyes widen. 

"Who the hell are you?" 


	19. Chapter 19

"So, in conclusion, can I crash here?"

Dick stares incredulously. The boy, who has introduced himself as Timothy ("Tim for short"), is as wobbly as a pencil. He looks wet behind the ears. _What the hell is Bruce thinking?_

Apparently the kid has put two and two together and come up with three.

"I know you used to be his kid. And now you're dead to him."

Dick decides this story is better than 'no, actually, there was this other kid, before you, you see, who you're apparently the replacement for, and he was butchered by this psychopathic monster...'

Dick sighs.

"Bruce and I have what is best described as a rocky relationship."

Tim nods understandingly.

"My dad and I...weren't on the best of terms either."

"I'm sorry." Dick has noted the _were_.

"Yeah." Tim sniffs and passes his sleeve cursorily over his face.

"I keep wishing..." here he breaks down-- "I had... _fixed_ things, you know?"

Dick feels a sudden twinge (of constipation). 

"Hey. You can crash here, as long as you want." He nods towards the sofa. "Just...one thing."

"You want to know why I left."

Dick cocks his head.

"Bruce...has these...nightmares."

"Oh."

_They must be pretty bad to drive this kid outta there._

"He gets...scary."

"Scary how?"

"Well...the other night I was going down for a drink of water, and I see him, eyes completely blank, sleepwalking repeatedly into the wall. He has a machete in his hand." here Tim falters, and ducks his head.

"Did he say anything?"

Tim shakes his head. "There was a low moaning sound coming out of his throat, you know? Like the sort cows make? You know, when they've had, like, their throats cut and the blood is gurgling out?"

Dick has to admit that he does not, in fact, know this sound.

"Sorry. My father owned a dairy." Tim is swinging his feet on the bar stool. Dick's head suddenly feels heavy.

"Okay. So...why don't we...take a time-out, and continue tomorrow?"

Tomorrow he's going to give a piece of his brain to Bruce, low moaning sounds regardless.

"Okay." Tim jumps off and heads towards the couch. He turns one last time.

"So...who's Jason?"

Dick clenches his teeth and turns around to smile at Tim.

"Um...what?"

"Jason."

"Never heard of him. Why?"

Tim's eyes turn from slits of curiosity to slits of overwhelming curiosity. (Dick's pupils have dilated.)

"Nothing. Just...overheard Alfred and Bruce. Talking, you know."

"Oh." Dick exhales. "No idea, kiddo. Might be best to ask them."

Tim shyly smiles and withdraws to the sofa. Dick heads to the kitchen and leans on the counter, head in hands.

"Never heard of him, huh?" says a sardonic voice behind him.


	20. Chapter 20

Talia al Ghul Wayne was young once, and passionate also. 

_Centuries I have awaited his coming, and alas, he is here._

_Now I no longer wait._

_Now I seize._

The boy-man, ice lake eyes, skeleton frame, curves of silver-black down glinting in moonlight. 

Her father had refused to see the coming of the Awaited One. But she had seen. Clearly.

(So maybe in hindsight it had not been him, but the Venom-inflated brute. Too bad.)

But Talia, like the proverbial princess, swoons.

It is not difficult to get Bruce to take her virginity. She is drop-dead gorgeous, the only woman for miles around, and the man has been celibate for three years in a monastery.

When her father finds out, Talia is reminded of why he is called the Demon.

It is hushed up. Bruce, ashamed of the potential dishonor he has brought to a distinguished family, agrees to marry Talia...provisionally. The marriage is not valid outside of Tibet.

When her husband-in-Tibet begins to leave, her heart flies out with him.

"Come with me, Talia."

Of what happens next, she has no notion. She says yes. She could swear it. But her lips obey another master.

"No.

"My father. I am bound. To another master, before you."

Bruce leaves.

Talia stays behind.

The fruit rots before it ever burgeons. Rots with an innocence and love crushed to make place for the Demon.

She names it Jason.

_One day you will find the Fleece your mother never found, because she lacked a true heart. You will find it, Jason, because your heart is true._

_Just like your father's._


	21. Chapter 21

Richard Grayson is having a bad day.

First, the incident reports overdue from his, ahem, _extremely_ _voluntary_ visit-less stay at the hospital.

Then, the replacement brother he wasn't aware of and never asked for showing up in his bachelor pad seeking shelter from his crazed, machete-wielding sleepwalker of a father.

To top it all off, a hallucination of his currently-dead brother (the crowbar-pulped and TNT-blown-up one), kicking him, very _really_ , in the balls.

Dick coughs. He's pissed in his pants.

"Okay, peace uncle times-up hold on." Dick grits out. "I admit I've been abusing you recently, dear subconscious, but even you have to admit it's mostly been _others_! Really, me and Arkham ain't mixing for another twenty years or so, so knock it off, dickwad!" he admonishes the interactive hologramic piece of his imagination masquerading as his late twerp of a brother.

Said twerp spits out very-real white-yellow phlegm onto said dickwad. 

"It's me, dumbass." Jason kneels, and, by way of proving it, reaches down to pinch Dick's dick.

There is a good deal of bile and other gross items streaming out of mouth onto floor after that.

Dick is convinced. Temporarily.

That his sleep-deprivation has reached an extreme stage of...deprivedness.

Jason decides to enlist help. He wakes up Tim.

Twenty minutes and a full mouth of macaroons later, Jason has convinced present assembly that Lazarus has indeed risen from the dead.

"But _how_?"

This from Tim. 

Tim is not _in_ the loop. 

Dick remembers, too late.

Jason has already poured out the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Dick sighs.

"I really need some sleep, Jay.

"Tomorrow, if you're still here, I'll consider freaking out and congratulating you and going into denial and the whole nine yards.

"Good night."


	22. Chapter 22

Tim confronts Bruce.

"So. You're Batman." 

Bruce spits out his coffee. 

"I'm sorry?" he blinks in mild confusion, like a harmless parakeet. (It is how _regular_ fathers would react to such an accusation, he imagines.)

"You're Batman," repeats Tim firmly, but less sure of himself.

"Yes, Tim." Bruce catches himself repeating. He's grinning like his life depends on it. "I'm Batman. And, what's more, Alfred's Robin."

"No. That was Dick."

_Okay. Slow and cautious._

"Sure, kiddo."

"Dick told me as much."

_Dick._

"He said he wanted me to have my eyes wide open about what I'm getting into, or some such thing. Said secrets ruin us."

This was the letter, but not the spirit, of Dick's injunction. The purpose of it was to hide Jason's reappearance until suitable time could be found to snap out of it.

"Don't you think it's even remotely possible he's come back?"

"Folie a deux," pronounces Dick.

"That's between life partners and family members, you idiot. We've known each other for half an hour."

"But it feels like a lifetime, don't you think?"

Tim is starting to feel that for all his supposed normalcy, Dick may be as sick as the rest of them.

Maybe something about resurrection is so cruel and unusual, a simple-hearted circus boy might prefer to believe himself going mad instead.

Or maybe...

Tim shelves his 'or maybe's for later, and focuses his attention on Bruce.

Bruce has dark saucers in place of eyes. 

His beloved son has, apparently, betrayed him. Tim longs to rush to Bruce, to comfort him, to wipe the sorrow puddles from his eyes, to let him know _everything is a-okay, your son is back, no more machetes in halls and cow blood-curdling sounds and sleepless nights. The prodigal corpse has returned._

Instead, he shifts in his seat.

"I don't care what you are," he says.

"All I care is...

_That you love me._

But he can't say that without making it weird.

Bruce's face flip-flops through eight or nine different emotions before settling on vaguely guilty.

"I'm sorry," he pronounces.

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you."

It has the air of a rehearsed speech.

Tim nods. _Everything in this damn house is a performance._

"It's okay."

_Can he chance it?_

"It's okay, Dad."

Bruce's apple moves down-up. 

"Well.

"If there is anything you need to know, Tim."

He smiles.

"Feel free to ask Dick."

He gets up and dusts his trousers off.

Tim feels like one of those specks of lint.


	23. Chapter 23

Jason started out with a clean plan.

Kidnap Dick. Break Joker out. (Beat the hell out of Joker, on a side note. But focus.)

Make Bruce choose.

Dick or Joker.

(The other one bites the bullet.)

It was water-tight, leak-proof. There were no weak links. Talia herself had agreed.

As long as he could get the drop on Dick, the rest should be no problem.

The problem was, he _did_ get the drop on Dick.

 _But what if_ , a small part of him whispers, _Bruce is crazy enough to choose Joker over Dick?_

_Huh._

_Are you ready for what's supposed to come next?_

_Do you have the guts for it, oh hero of the fighting pits._

_Whatever it takes._

_You swore an oath. On your own fucking grave._

Dickie. In his crinkled jammies, in his bed. Rolling over and scratching his stomach in the most unappealing way possible.

"Hey, Jaybird!

"How was skool?"

"Shut up, twerp."

The deep rumbling laughter shaking his room. Dick patting the warm covers, inviting him to sit in his own bed.

"Get your own damn bed, Boy Nuisance."

Alfred running up, afraid of another Civil War. 

_Fuck._

Jason starts crying. 

_Your only opponent is yourself._

_All wars are won or lost in the head first._

_You are strong, Jason, of body._

_But I see a weakness in you. A tenderness, instilled by your master._

_Crush it, as you would crush an insect._

_Think nothing of it. It is a nuisance, nothing more._

_It cannot interfere in your potential._

_It_ will _not._

And Talia?

Talia, with her deep, brazen voice and her hand of firm steering.

_You are not a shipwreck, Jason._

_Your destiny is out there, waiting for you._

_You're broken, but who isn't?_

_My son._

She'd called him son, in secret whispers during afternoon siestas. 

_What do I want?_

_Mother._

_I want my mother._


	24. Chapter 24

"It's him or me, Bruce.

"Choose!"

Bruce. Joker, quivering with something that's positively not fear. Dick, stiff as a board. Jason, with one gun in each hand.

When time strikes now, he will fire both. Bruce has to save one. His son or his responsibility. 

Bruce's brain is still floating in cerebro-spinal fluid. His screams are raging in unsounded ears. There is a boot pressing on his heart.

_Jason._

He did not know he was speaking out loud.

"Jason."

His voice is cracked. His mind is on a loop. _Jason. Jason. Jason._

Joker giggles out through three broken ribs.

"Batsy." Joker's voice is smooth velvet.

"Good times we've had together.

"But I'm afraid this would seem to be adieu."

"Shut up, clown!" Jason's anger is getting rawer by the minute. He clubs Joker on the side of the face with the butt of his hand gun. 

Bruce has the stilled look of a man in a dream. 

"Jason."

Dick smiles brightly. "Looks like he's gone into shock, Jaybird. Maybe you shoulda...eased him into this or something?"

"Bruce." Jason says softly, coming down to kneel at the level of his face.

"I'm here. This is not a dream.

"If you don't choose, Bruce, you're living with the consequences for the rest of your life."

Both Dick and Joker snort at this. 

"You know there's only one of us you have the guts to kill, kid." This from the clown.

"But...what did Dick ever do to you?" This from a pale, bloodshot Bruce. 

Jason sighs, and rubs his nose. 

_Every piece of broken bone jutting out into pools of yellow sickly light makes Joker laugh harder._

_Jason's groans and screams are answered by a_ drip drip drip _._

_"Do you know," says the Joker, "I wasn't always like this."_

_Jason's head is swimming._

_"Oh no you don't."_

_Joker grabs a pail and empties the shock of the contents onto Jason's head. Jason sputters._

_"So, like I said, I wasn't always like this."_

_Jason cracks one eye. He tilts his chin back. Jason Todd would go out like a fucking champ._

_The rocket of spittle dives straight into Joker's open cackling mouth._

_Joker simply laughs._

_"You're too adorable, you know that?" he says, licking lips._

_"_ You _shoulda been the favorite._

_"Batsy is gonna suffer after you're gone, make no mistake. He's gonna become a shell of a man, a pit of a stomach._

_"But...he won't_ stop living. _"_

Jason looks at Dick with sad, sad eyes. 

"Bruce." He says, looking straight into Bruce's shadow of a face

"I forgive you.

"I forgive you for choosing Dick over me. I forgive you for replacing me. 

"I forgive you for not avenging my death." 

Bruce looks up curiously, like a lance is piercing his chest. 

"But you know there's _one_ thing, Bruce. That I can never forgive you."

Bruce swallows. He nods. 

"You'll never forgive me for _living_."

"Yes."

Bruce understands. He _more_ than understands. He's been living the feeling for thirty years. 

Forgiveness is not a choice. It's not something that has to make sense. 

It's our reaction to the embarrassment of living. 

The dead can _choose_ not to forgive. They're dead, after all. 

Going on without them is saying, 'you're not the air I breathe, you're not the skin I wear, yours is not the song I wake up for in the morning. You see, I can live without. I _am_ living, without.'

And much as Bruce's life seems like a shadow now, there _were_ days he sighed when the daylight caressed his cheek. 

There _were_ days Alfred's thin, papery smile brought a stern spire of joy shooting out of his rib cage. 

There _were_ days Dick somersaulting in the cave and banging his head against one of the stalactites dragged a chuckle out of his throat. 

He was _alive._

There was no way not to be. 

"And for that, I am sorry.

"My son." 

Jason Todd, age 16, child of hell, kneels before erstwhile father.

"I know you're sorry. Dad.

"But sorry isn't enough, you asshole."

"Jason, that's enough!" Dick screams.

"You don't know the half of it, Jay!

"You think you're so special? That you can wear your grudge like a fucking badge?

"We _both_ know how you ended up in Joker's warehouse that night."

Jason Todd. Age 14. Bitter beating red heart clinging to his ribcage. 

_Golden boy. Golden boy. Golden boy._

Bruce had fired him. He had been kind, and gentle, and everything no one had ever been to Jason Todd.

He'd given the moon to Jason. 

_It was always the Golden Boy._

Jason knows who is second best. He knows he is too impulsive, too ragged at the edges, too...unheroic.

Robin, to him, was never a job. 

It was a fucking _joy._

The shorts digging into his thighs, the weight of the grappling hook on his waist, the sleek cool steel of the bararang in his palm.

He felt fucking _alive._

And Bruce had taken it away.

Whether it was some childish impulse of punishment, or just a necessary dragging of his feet to the end of the rest of his anticlimax of a life, that was when he decided. 

He'd go out with a bang. 


	25. Chapter 25

"When we make choices, son," 

Thomas Wayne intones on a lonely summer day,

"We are choosing between two distinct possibilities...

"Without knowing shit about what either one is.

"Blessed are the blind, my son. 

"At least they _know_ they cannot see."

Funny, that his father should give him this lecture three days before his death of a wrong turn in an alley.

Dick is getting tired. A part of him wishes Jason would just turn the gun on all _three_ of them, before turning it on himself.

We're all rushing. Like cows, as Tim would say. Away from the slaughterhouse.

But what's so bad about the slaughterhouse anyway? 

Dick has seen brain guts bone shattered on stone. 

He knew his life was over. 

He would never fly again. 

Not _him._

So what? Big fuck.

Robin still flew.

Dick resurrects himself. And not just once. Again and again.

He doesn't need any fancy green chemical vats. He feels a frission of scorn for this entitled asshole whose greatest accomplishment is crawling out of a pit and holding a knife to his father's throat.

The man who took you in.

Who _held_ you as you slept. Who tossed and turned for endless miles of sleepless nights because youdecided to teach him a fucking _lesson._

Because you thought if you couldn't have him, neither should anyone else. 

"Fuck you!"

Dick gets up.

Joker starts cackling again.

"Shut up, Jack.

"Jason, you fucking coward. Shoot me already. Stop cowering, stop putting it on Bruce's shoulders. _Choose._ Right now."

Jason straightens up. He points the gun.

At Jack.

He pulls the trigger.

Joker's brains scatter onto the wall like graffiti. _Brain paint._

Neither of the boys fail to notice the sound emanating from Bruce's throat now.

Bruce crawls over to Jack. He turns over the body, and puts what is left of that misfortunate crown in his lap. Ketchup sploshing in a bowl of green. 

They're silent.

Bruce's face peels off in layers. First there is blank alabaster, followed by green nausea, then blood flowering fresh in his cheeks. 

Like a newborn. 

"You wanted to know, Jason. Why. I kept him alive."

"I don't know."

Dick kneels. 

"You _do_ know, Bruce. You were doing the right thing. You were trying to."

"And what is that. The right thing."

Bruce and Dick and Jason look down at the sad clown. 

"He was trying to find the funny in life." Jason says. 

"He was horrible at it."

They laugh. 


	26. Epilogue

Bruce and Dick and Jason and Tim live happily ever after. 

Well, not quite. 

Jason blows his brains out. 

He's come and done what needed to be done. 

Bruce and Dick give him a decent funeral.

Tim confesses to having killed his parents. 

He's put in Arkham. 

"I'm glad he confessed."

"You knew? All along?"

Bruce and Dick have a rocky start to their dating relationship. 

They're in love. And Dick is twenty now. 

All the laws in heaven and all the taboos on Earth can't keep Batman and Robin from finding happiness.

Alfred leaves in disgust. 

He decides the Lazarus Pit might as well be put to good use. To bring back someone actually worth living.

On Mother's Day, Bruce finds Martha Wayne's crypt has been burgled.

He sighs. 

As long as there are Lazarus Pits in the world, death's a fucking _joke._

Now Jack would have found that funny.

He suits up for patrol. 

"Wear the Robin costume. For me. This time."

Batman and Robin hunt down the streets of Gotham, while a whiff of Oud steals over Jason's grave like a mother's sigh.

The End


End file.
